Notes: Tough field with four of the Top 10…Tough starts for (1) Murray after a bye vs. Mahut, (15) Andujar vs. Llodra, (10) Dimitrov vs. Hewitt 2nd rd., (13) Nieminen vs. Harrison, and (3) Del Potro vs. X-Man…Qualifying to the main draw were Brit Jamie Baker, Serbian Ilija Bozoljac, Australian Samuel Groth, and Spain’s Feliciano Lopez…First time in eight years at the event for Berdych…Del Potro is back from his long respiratory illness…Murray returns from the back injury that forced him to miss Roland Garros…Former champs in the field are Cilic (2012), Murray (2011,’09), Querrey (2010), and Hewitt (2006,’02-00).

Notes: Rafa pulls out to rest the knees after his Roland Garros run…Tough starts for (3) Haas after a bye vs. Gulbis or Baghdatis, (5) Raonic vs. Monfils, and (4) Nishikori after a bye vs. Youzhny…Janko Tipsarevic also pulled…Former champs in the field are Haas (2012,’09), Kohlschreiber (2011), and Federer (2008,’08,’06-03).

Notes: Jankovic takes the claycourt wildcard after her deep run at Roland Garros…A new event, it joins Stuttgart as the only German cities to host WTA events…Notable pulls from the event were Bethanie Mattek-Sands, Flavia Pennetta and Carla Suarez Navarro.

Roger has some points to be gained here. He is much behind in the race to WTF. Already Roger can only go down from here as he already won Wimbledon and Cincinnati last year. I am not sure whether he will be able to recreate his magic in Wimbledon this time around. Considering his present level of form, that looks unlikely. But I wish him all the best.

federer will drop 450 points after olympics date so even if wins wimbledon it’s possible ferrer and nadal will both overtake him and he’ll drop from the top 4.
if he doesn’t make wimbledon final, seems pretty likely.
he says he doesn’t care too much about ranking. he’ll start to care when he’s drawing top-4ers in the QF.

Nole has not been playing a grass warm-up since 2011. I think Federer and Djokovic are the only guys to win Wimbledon without a grass warm-up in the last 10 years. Has anyone other than Federer, Nole or Borg achieved this?

Olympics is a tournament whose importance has been heightened because Federer was one of the top male players to acknowledge it.

In 90s, Sampras couldn’t even be bothered to play it. Even when Agassi won, his career was in the dumps. The honor roll of past olympic champions is a list of 2nd rung players. Agassi, the tennis player was in the dumps when he got to play the olympics.

2008 was the 1st time tennis was played in a venue that was a regular on the tour. Rafa had already won Beijing once, so it was not an obscure tournament in a city like Athens, Atlanta or even Sydney, where most tennis stars have never played before.

2012 was special because Wimbledon, the greatest event on the tennis calendar was hosting the olympics.

Olympics in tennis is awkward. Do other sports recognise tennis gold medal as equivalent to the 100m gold? I dont think they do. Does even the ATP care for it? It gives 750 points – technically even inferior to a masters series. If you average it over 4years – it is worth less than a 250.

Hard to convince anyone Olympics means a lot in our sport. Yes, the winners like Massu or Rosset might want to claim it is the greatest thing in the tennis world, but surely that is far-off from the truth.

It doesn’t matter what you or I think about the Olympics, it’s the players themselves. It’s not about points or prize money, it’s about something that can’t be quantified. They would play regardless of points and already play without prize money. That says something.

Agassi and Graf are on record as saying their winning gold medals are their most treasured memories. Djokovic and Delpo fell to their knees in tears merely winning bronzes, Federer’s emotional response at making the Gold medal match – those reactions speak volumes. Try to spin it any way you like. I suspect you’d be singing a different tune had the outcome of the Gold medal match been different.

On another note, it’s so wonderful to see tennis back on grass. The courts at Queens are second to none.

@the DA: the Olympics is up there. For this present bunch, IMO it’s right behind winning a slam. Rafa, Novak for sure would pick it over a WTF. Same with Andy, and I think even Fed would. It’s a rare achievement, you only get a chance once every 4 years in the biggest sporting event the world has known. And it’s prestige is only rising with every and each passing event. Those who are knocking it only doing so by being blind to the players desire to win it and regard for it. Look at Fed: he’s 31 and he states he want to play Rio 2016: pretty much sums up how highly he regards it.

@Squirrel: Thanks for the link : who would have thought that Fed would be such a expert in selling himself – I mean his name, or whatever he sells- to the big companies? 10 year contracts-mmmmm….. Not just the love of the game that’s keeping him around eh…….. Keep fattening your bank account fed with these deals, as Rafa, Novak, Muzza and a fair few others are diminishing your pay on court!

If the players really thought olympics was the 5th slam, they should convince the ATP to award 2000 points to it.

If you cannot quantify it, then it is only an opinion. Danny has more proof than DA saying ” I can feel what the players feel”. Sorry, unless you are a pro-tennis player with multiple slams that doesn’t cut it.

Squirrel:

Federer is the greatest icon tennis has ever had. The guy makes more endorsement money than double of both nadal and djokovic’s endorsements combined. This is when he is well past his peak years of 2004-07. Salute to the Fed. He could have quit tennis like Borg did when he lost to Jmac. Instead Fed showed how Champions fight every adversity. It has netted him 5 additional slams, 20+weeks at no.1 and he has surely surpassed Borg’s iconic status in the game.

Joker smashed half a dozen racquets after he was ousted in the 2012 Olympics. Emotions much.
All the players yearn for a medal, be it bronze, silver or gold. It’s not as if the Olympics comes round every year, it comes round every 4 years which makes it all the more exciting, akin to the World Cup.

That’s not what I said at all. Players are on record expressing what they feel. Nice try. Must spin better.

“they should convince the ATP to award 2000 points to it.”

Why? To validate it to your satisfaction? If the points were that important, it’d be done by now. Again, it’s just your opinion. The importance the players place on attending and their emotional reactions speak for themselves.

‘The importance the players place on attending and their emotional reactions speak for themselves.’: THIS! Rafa missed USO, AO, WTF in his layoff. When asked which tourny was the biggest disappointment for him to miss without hesitation he said: the olympics. Why? He cited the honour of playing in such a event, the rarity of it, the passion of the players competing at it etc. Just look at world no.1 Novak Djokovic’s reaction when he lost the bronze match, not gold, he was in tears, inconsolable, breaking racquets in dismay that he didn’t win a medal for his country. Can you honestly see him reacting likewise if he lost in a MS final or a WTF final- I highly doubt it! Players do NOT wish for a GS due to the 2,000 ranking points. LOL. It’s due to the honour of winning one, the prestige, the history of it. Likewise with the Olympics: ranking points is meaningless and irrelevant, but the honour, prestige of it: PRICELESS!

So, according to some Fedbots, Fed is the greatest icon tennis ever had because of the size of his endorsement portfolio. So to them Maria Sharapova is the greatest on the women’s side, I mean, that candy revenue stream is nothing to be sniffed at, right?

PS: the prestige of winning the olmpics is gaining undeniably with each and every passing event. When the winners roll call reads of STEFFI GRAFF, SERENA WILLIAMS on the women’s side, ANDRE AGASSI, RAFAEL NADAL, ANDY MURRAY on the mens side: you bet your last dollar on future generation of tennis players wanting to join that exclusive club! To try and knock it’s growing prestige, importance to the players in their desire to have a great resume is just absolute and utter folly. Even ignorance when considering that the players cannot already state enough how prestigious it is to compete in such a event let alone win it!

@Nadalista, I agree with those that Roger Federer currently is the biggest tennis icon (Rafa Nadal isn’t that far behind him). However, money is not and should never be the criteria for your iconic status. If Rafa were a Brit or dating Shakira, he’d have left every other tennis player in the $$ department. That still would not have made him above Roger’s 17 GS.
Serena is a big champion and far ahead of Maria Sharapove, but guess what? Masha earns more money than any other female athlete in the world. So is she the biggest female sporting icon? Hell No! She’s just a glamorous girl who happened to win a few tennis GS.

Those Fed fans questioning the importance of the Olympics gold should ask Roger Federer what he thinks of it. I wouldn’t be too surprised if he’d rather an olympic singles gold over another Slam. He’s 32 but really wants to have another shot at the Games gold in 2016. That says a lot, no?

@the DA: exactly. It’s a huge, huge prize that all the top players wish for, and pursue. Knocking it’s importance really shows nothing other than being blind to the reality of it’s prestige for the players. IMHO: Andy winning the gold at Wimbledon of all venue, trumps anything he could do possibly achieve in the game such as winning WTF, outside of winning a slam. I believe for the players, after a GS it’s the next one they desire most to win. It’s a win that goes beyond the sport due to the uniqueness of the event.

Olympic golds got relevance last 2 editions, or we can say after Agassi won it. It doesn’;t have pedigree due to not being relevant in the past.
But yes, nowadays is somehting the players desire a lot, being able to represent their country and all. So, for the players maybe higher than WTF, but for the tennis comunity as whole, past and present, I still don’t think so. Maybe with bigger names winning it in the future this may change, We already have, Nadal and Murray as Olympic winners and if this players, the actually best in the world win next edition, the importance will get higher in history books.
But as of now is debatable.

My 8 year old son is happy that the French Open finally got to play the american anthem when Serena won. He says he is happy to move on to grass court season where american men have a chance since they all “stink on clay, especially red clay in Europe.” LOL.

No he only wore Rafa for the semi. He dressed in Miami Heat clothes on the Sunday as he hosted his second of two birthday parties on Sunday (one a tennis tourney the other a pool party) so he wore a bathing suit and a Miami Heat Jersey. He didn’t think Nadal needed him as much as the Heat did on Sunday.
#onechampiondefended
#cantheheatdothesame

Giles, Melzer-Petzschner (2 time grand slam champs, including Wimbledon 2010) were a tough first round draw. I saw part of the match and those guys did much better at net and communicating than Fed and Haas, who both went for the same shot (Fed’s forehand and Tommy’s backhand) several times.

@RZ and Giles, ‘those guys did much better at net and communicating than Fed and Haas’ – not surprising for a first-time partnership. I like the idea of F & H playing doubles together, though; I hope they continue.

@Jane – I saw that. his game was not unlike Raonic’s – big serve, first strike tennis. I think it’s a smart move. Ivan can be funny on twitter. He got involved today with gossip that Sharapova would make a surprise visit to Queen’s to watch Grigor.

Viz – Definitely true, especially as compared to M&P who’ve played together regularly for a few years now. Fed and Haas looked like they were having fun out there together, which is good. I’d like to see them continue to play together too.

I am sorry, but the endorsements is only 1 way of cutting at things. Federer has 4 laureus awards, 10 ATP fan favorite awards – has been the fan favorite since 2003. Has been voted by peers for Stefan Edberg Sportsmanship award – winning it more times than Edberg himself.

I know you rafabots don’t want to digest the truth, but Federer is Messi and Beckham – both it’s greatest player and icon – much like Woods is for Golf. For women’s tennis it is 2 different people, Serena is the greatest active player, Maria is the greates tennis and Women’s Icon/brand. Federer has more than Serena’s achievements (who has more achievements than nadal and co) and Maria’s endorsements [who has more endorsements than nadal and co].

It is a tough pill for federer haters to swallow, but remember this – does federer get booed at the venue of his greatest achievement like nadal did at Philippe Chatrier? No. Does Federer get his integrity questioned by an ex-champion of the tournament he dominates? [Yannick Noah].

Federer actually gets support even against home players like the WTF semi-final where the Londoners supported Fed more than murray and even booed murray at one point. Similarly, the aussies love Fed more than Hewitt. I can go on, but every one except rafabots who live in a world of denial, everyone can see the truth. The tennis writers and experts do and they are the one who decide tennis history.

Oh – and ask the players the most important tournament routine. Federer would value Basel title and had he never won it, he might want to play that till he is 35 or 35 too – Does that make it bigger than the Year End Championship or Masters series – which have more importance in our sport?

If it is for the prestige and honor of playing for your country, is there a vast difference between a singles Gold and Doubles Gold? Surely becker’s doubles gold is no inferior than Massu’s singles gold?

Please, murray fans are the least qualified to call anyone disgruntled – the guy is perennially a 4th wheel to the top 3. Only fans more disgruntled must be ferrer or almagro’s who choke even worse than murray does. Please get back to Federer fans after murray comes even close to overtaking Nole, forget Rafa and Roger.

Giles: ITF handles the points for Olympics, but the ATP has a strong say in it. The ATP is after all, the players’ association. I am sure they will achieve the greater points to olympics medals, but there are a lot of issues – not least of which is Olympics is about the amateur spirit of the sport, while tennis is the very epitome of Pro-sport. I mean Olympics has soccer too, but surely everyone knows the real deal is World Cup and the Euro/Copa america in the next rung and the Champions League followed by EPL and La liga or Serie A.

@Simon, it seems Rafa Nadal has 11.7 million fans on Facebook and 4.5 million followers on Twitter. For a guy who was out of action for 7 months, he’s pretty popular, no? Or maybe something is wrong, I don’t know. Or maybe millions of tennis fans don’t think like you?

Somehow Grigor squeaks through. I suspect it will be maddening to be a fan of his in the coming years. I liked how the cameras kept panning to the ball girls (obviously fans of his) who looked so anxious he might be knocked out. hehe

@contador, Rafa fans having a go at Federer is as wrong as Fed fans having a go at Nadal, which is what Simon did. Neither Rafa nor Roger are perfect. They both have their flaws. Yes, even the Swiss great. But I don’t wanna get into it now…

Do not worry. There will always be balance. James is trying the usual rafabot trick like when he kept mum on his fellow rafabot steve27’s racist joke on serbians.

No one said Rafa is not popular. Just that Federer is way ahead of him. Just like with the slams, weeks at no.1 and year end championships.

If you accept Federer is

a) the GOAT
b) the Greatest tennis star

without making smartazz or backhanded comments like James or other rafabots, everything will be fine.

I still don’t get why murray’s fans try to get into these top 3 discussions. They should stick to other under-achievers who serve as door-mats for the success of the top 3 like ferrer, almagro, berdych, and the likes.

Any fan can have a dog in the fight. I mistakenly name “rafa fans” when it is more on the scale from those whom are mildly anti-fed and can be pushed into the fight, to the ornery ones who cannot pass teasing sometimes= me, to those vehemently anti-fed and will initiate and hunt for a fight = the ones with a big salt shaker looking for an open wound or two…lols….

O= those who are too madly in love and have left reality for fantasyland and beyond anti-fed the skin is too thin to be a barrier to salt from the salt shaker.

not enough room, but of course the continuum continues on the other side of federer extending to anti-nadals and beyond to another O. That is how I see it. It could make a good cartoon too, if I was more artistic and talented ;)

I can get by reading French but speaking it is limited to single words and some expressions/phrases. It helps when live-streaming sports here in the US to have French, Italian, or Spanish – to me Italian is the easiest to follow when listening. Anyway, back to tennis…http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5cw-x5MokrM

This is a bit of today’s doubles match : Hass -Federer or Melzer – Petzschner fans.

Federer I must say looks really good now with the haircut slightly grown out and I am loving the freedom I feel seeing him without that headband! Hoping he keeps hair like that and no headband for a while :D

That is a complete misrepresentation of what he said. The article was based on an interview he gave to the BBC earlier in the day where he merely described how the ranking system compares to golf. Here is the exact passage:

As you’ll see he does not “call for a 2-year ranking system” at all. This is very disappointing coming from a paper like the Guardian. Probably too late to stop the controversy from blowing up. No wonder he’s so wary of journalists.

Raonic over LaMonf in 3 * also ***
Kamke over Kubot in 3
Struff (ger) over LMayer (arg) who is Stuff? big bruiser youngish
German. ***
Melzer over Ghedin in 2
Gulbis over Baghdatis in 3 *
Kohlschreiber over Berlocq in 2
_______________________________________________________

Aegon aka Queens

Querrey over Bedene in 2 ***
Delpo over Malisse in 3 (tricky match though) ***
FLopez over Berankis in 2
Becker over Tomic in 3
Benneteau over Mannarino in 2
Zemlja over Edmund in 2 (who is Edmund?)?? no idea.
Rosol over Groth in 2
Eminem ober RHarrison in 2 (Harrison – please go into tennis commentating! )

Istomin over Kuznetsov (Ruskie one) in 2
De Schepper over Ram in 3 ***
Cilic over Dodig in 2 ***
Benoit Paire over Kudla in 2
Dolly over Giraldo in 3
Llordra over Andujar in 3
Mahut over RWilliams in 2

I can respect that you like Tsonga. although a Fed career fan, we all need to get ready soon as fans for other players. Just Tsonga got good younger. Like him too.

Will Rafa be the last young guy to come on the scene and make such an impact? i remember when Roddick played him on indoors Clay in a DC match and Rafa won at a tender young age. When i saw him blowong winners by Roddick, it was like, who is this guy?

Contador, the end was dull, so do you think they should have reseeded nadal? The absence of Murray and Delpo detracted from the tournament along with berdych losing early and fed playing a bad quarter and tspnga abad semi.

I think they should have reseeded him. I think they were worried it would open a can of worms but if there were ever a case to make an exception at that tournament this was it,

I mean rafa took time off so I guess he got what he deserved but I thought it was unfair to Novak, who has earned a little protection by being the number one ranked player by a lot to have to play the seven time champion and favorite in the semi. I guess we all got the match we wanted and it was every bit as special as anticipated but it felt like it should have been Sunday.

On the Wimbles seeds we are guessing until the results of Halle and Queens are known, technically – who knows if it makes any difference in reality though lol, wimbledon organizers will do what they want!

Federer is to this point a shadow of his usual form let alone his form when he was in his prime. Still, the past two events he’s gone 8-2 (an improvement from the earlier portion of 2013). Maybe a win in Halle and he is 12-2 heading into SW19.

But I would swap out Ferrer for a darker horse ; maybe Delpo for someone else too.
_________________________________

@ Viz

The pictures from the Tour de Suisse are incredible – it was not sunny today but the rain-soaked roads makes the race a bit more exciting on the descents. But roads in Switzerland are more like autobahns than the goat paths in Italy – which are way more fun.

If Nadal is seeded 5, he could draw Roger for a quarter finals clash. Doubt it’ll be Nole or Andy. It will be interesting if Roger and Rafa clash again on grass. It could give Roger more confidence to face Rafa on this surface than any other. That could make it interesting.

The Committee of the Wimbledon Championships at the All England Club, has a week to decide on the order of seeds in their tournament 2013, to its list of seeded Wimbledon usually use their right to modify the order of ATP rankings, according to the results on grass: Normally, the previous year. Nadal is a two-time champion at the All England finalist and three times. “Wimbledon adores Nadal, but any decision falls to the Committee,” he told AS Philip Brook, executive director of the English tournament.

I like the visual of a cage, it’s very apt (remembers the monkey house at London Zoo). He comes here to flail around whenever Fed suffers what he considers to be an unjust loss (Murray at Shanghai & AO, Nadal at IW) and insults the players as well as their fans. Or whenever Rafa achieves another milestone. He’s a little nicer to Nole but then, unlike Rafa & Andy, he has a losing H2H. Ho hum.

Simon 2:38:
Yannick Noak cuestioned Rafa’s integrity, and his countryman Michel Llodra appeared then to say something like this man Noah’s head doesn’t run very well…

About Olympics again (sorry), I think too that Wawa-Fed doubles gold medal has the same “sporting value” than a tennis single medal.

And I repeat that I find very difficult to be at the same time the Goat and a true gentleman, and Roger got this. The other side: he sometimes avoids getting involved in controversy when the fairest would be to go into it.

Gulbis forehand is technically flawed. His backhand on the other hand is a beauty. Since I am on this thread I will restrain myself from talking about Nadal and actually try to discuss grass court tennis.

Hi Jane! How are you. Always find grass season the place to expect the unpredictable because its so short. As I said last night I have never played on grass and I just don’t understand the formula for success.

Im so proud of our Brit guys and gals,they all seem to love playing the GC season,great win for Dan Evans against a player ranked world no 76,dissapointed but proud of James Ward beaten in a 3 set tie break by Ivan Dodig,great win too for Heather Watson,looking forward to seeing Andy back again tomorrow,although im wary about his game against Malisse,after what happened last year,i want Andy to have a good run hear at Queens to set himself up nicely for Wimbledon,go Andy.

Dissapointing that the matches hear at Queens, keep getting interupted because of the rain,they keep showing repeats of yesterdays matches,im watching a repeat of the final between JWT and Murray in the final two years ago,great match though.

Woops meant Mahut not Malisse in my earlier post,Delpo is playing Malisse,Delpo won the 1st set on a tight tie breaker,but took the 2nd set 6-1,hes absolutely out playing Delpo,up a break in the 3rd set now,playing very consistent and beautiful tennis.

@skeezer—have u ever played on grass? Has anyone here? I would be very interested to here some input on it. There is only one grass court in Miami and I have never had the motivation to book it when there are so many great clay and hardcourts. But I should, just to try it.

The Delpo/Malisse match was of very high quality,i have never seen Malisse play that well in a long time,both players going for their shots been aggressive,Malisse was the slightly better player IMO,and Delpo was a touch lucky to get the W in the end.

Malisse always plays well in Queens. I remember one year he beat Novak I think. Or was it Murray? It was the year they all crashed out (Rafa, Novak, Murray and then I think Querrey won the tourney?) Or am I hallucinating this happened?

I just looked it up. It was Novak at Queens. Surprisingly, Novak and Malisse have only played twice their head to head is 1-1 and both matches went to a decider. I think that was the year where he played really bad though, right up until the USO when he almost lost to troicki but then began his ascent to the top beating Fed in the semi.

I remember Nadal lost to Feliciano Lopez that same tournament. (Brad Gilbert called it a Mulligan) and I think Roddick lost to Dudi Sela. I don’t remember who Murray lost to.

Brando Says:
@Squirrel: Thanks for the link : who would have thought that Fed would be such a expert in selling himself – I mean his name, or whatever he sells- to the big companies? 10 year contracts-mmmmm….. Not just the love of the game that’s keeping him around eh…….. Keep fattening your bank account fed with these deals, as Rafa, Novak, Muzza and a fair few others are diminishing your pay on court!

June 10th, 2013 at 10:17 am

Brando, what has happened to your posts recently? You never used to be this bitchy about fed. Everyone who plays tennis at a high level is making money through their own talent and they deserve it.

In fact, it was Fed who argued for the lesser known players who get paid a pittance for entry, that they should get a rise in fees in order to pay for their travel expenses, hotels, physio, etc., and couldnt afford to, it’s thanks to fed that this was sanctioned, at wimbledon of all places. So no need for that.

Ah, that’s it – leaving court again. The weather forecast is not good either. : / Sounds like they are replaying Hewitt beating Dimitrov. I was kind of surprised by that, but not entirely. Just thought Dimitrov might do well on the grass.

Leyton really rolled back the years with that match against Grigor,such a talented and up and coming young player,Leyton reminded me of why he won Wimbledon all those years ago,playing such fantastic tennis,hes won the Queens trophy 4 times so he a very acomplished GC player,hes one of the players outside the top 4 of the older generation i really enjoy watching,shame he lacks that consistency,such a fighter thats unfortunatly lost a step which happens with age,i would love to see him have another good run at Wimbledon.

I switched over to that. yes it work really well on grass. But what a contrast in courts. It looks bedraggled compared to the lush courts at Queens. I remember Roddick used to say they were the best grass courts in the world.

Jane at Queens theres a repeat now going on of the Rafa/Nole final in 2008,i dont get the Halle tournament where i am,the grass looks bald,compared to what it does today,but im guessing it was due to wear and tear on the surface,as it was the end of the tournament,both players look so different,Rafa with his short sleeves and pirate shorts,and Nole had more meat on his bones.

Thanks for the heads up alison; I remember that was a high quality Rafole final.

DA, i agree about the Halle court; I noticed that yesterday during the Gulbis/Baggy match. I wonder why that is? Upkeep? Less rain? Because of the roof? Queens always looks so lush! Would be lovely if the sun would just shine a little bit more.

Another tongue in cheek hypothetical… Is there any room to assume Fed’s altruistic efforts to grant lower ranked players more money to attain proper physio and trainer services, creating a higher density of parody among the up-and-coming players, a covert angle to protect some of his more gaudy records?